Policy: Washington’s climate — hot rhetoric, cold comfort as a few good employees struggle on — Wednesday, October 2, 2013 — www.eenews.netThe shutdown comes at an especially inconvenient time for climate research; a number of scientists with NOAA were co-authors of the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, which was released in full Monday (ClimateWire, Oct. 1).Since the shutdown, these experts are no longer available to help interpret the 2,000-page document for journalists or policymakers.”The scientists involved in that, by and large, will not be helpful to the administration or to Congress in terms of formulating what new policies or approaches that might be dictated by that information … which is very critical,” said Steven Murawski, formerly the chief scientist of the National Marine Fisheries Service under NOAA and now a professor of marine science at the University of South Florida. “Without scientific information, this becomes an exercise in belief rather than fact.”